Monthly Archives: March 2019

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; and he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! for it is written,

‘Worship the Lord your God,
and serve only him.’”

Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.

Matthew 4:10-11

You can have it all. Really, you can. Someone on a commercial just told me.

The tragedy is that we believe it. We strive for it. Envy burns within as our coworker gets the promotion, our siblings gets the boat, our neighbor gets the in-ground pool. We are always looking for fulfillment on the outside, aren’t we?

Jesus heard the words, too. You can have it all! And don’t think for a moment he didn’t pause. Let us not forget that Jesus was fully human. Jesus was not at all immune to the twinge of envy, the surge of lust, the enticement of you-can-have-it-all. Shortly before his crucifixion, he’d even agonize over his vocation: “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me” (Matthew 26:39).

Perhaps, Jesus even thought to himself, “I’ve heard this story before.” Surging into his memory comes the recollection of a day when, gathered with other Jewish boys, he hears the original temptation story of Genesis 3 told. Images of the slithering snake, the promise of power and knowledge, and the sting of shame flood his mind. You, Jesus, can have it all.

Consider this, too. Not only is Jesus fully human, but Jesus is also fully God. He was present at creation, in creation. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. I’m speculating here, but maybe something of his own original, Trinitarian imagination surged within the moment. Could it be that Jesus recalled the original simplicity and beauty of Eden, capturing it in words familiar to any Jew of that day:

‘Worship the Lord your God,
and serve only him.’”

Maybe in that one crucial moment, Jesus remembered. Maybe in the midst of the you can have it all whisper, Jesus recalled – Worship the Lord and serve only him. Maybe he remembered his origins. Maybe he remembered his birthright. Maybe he remembered that humanity is born of more simple things – earth, soil, humility.

That’s it, isn’t it? You see, if God is God, then you don’t have to be. You can give up your relentless, exhausting attempt to be more than you are – richer, sexier, stronger. You can remember that “everything I have is already yours.” You don’t need anything more. God is God, you’re not, and that’s that. You can remember. You can receive. You can rest, returning the humble ground of your being.

The words Jesus found in that moment were familiar ones, repeated often in his Scriptures – Deuteronomy, 1 Samuel, Isaiah, and in many other paraphrases. They are a call to remember. It was a way of saying, “Let’s get back to the basics – to who I am, who you are, to who we are together.” Worship is not some demand of a narcissistic God, but an invitation to be re-oriented rightly, to return to the ground of our beings, to accept the gift of the dust. Worship is the great return to our depths.

It’s hard to remember. That’s why we need Lent. In the midst of a world that says, “You can have it all,” Jesus reminds us that we already do. We need not attain it. We need not achieve it. We, more often than not, simply fall into it.

__________

Prayer:

Jesus, it’s hard to imagine resisting that “you can have it all” voice as you did. The security you had in being God’s beloved is remarkable. I long for this, too. In my head, I can believe that I have it all in you, but it’s a much harder journey to live it. Will you whisper it to me regularly, by your Spirit? Amen

She sends an email to me with an anxious energy to it. In it, she writes, “Seriously, I’ve not given any thought to Lent this year, and I’m not sure what I should give up.”

“Why don’t you give up being so anxious?” I say. She isn’t amused. We know each other well enough for the banter, but my response also touches a deeper pain within her.

“I haven’t known a day without anxiety for years,” she says. “At least Lent gives me some control over it. I can give up chocolate or social media and feel a little better about myself.”

Hmmm.

Later I call her and check in further. Every year, the anxiety ramps up around this time, she tells me. New Year commitments to diet and exercise have faded. Lent seems like the perfect opportunity to recommit. I sense her weariness. I want to be sensitive, and yet I’m mad. I’m mad at Lenten diets. I’m mad at liturgical pragmatism. I’m mad not at her, but for her. I know her story – the expectations she lives with, the buzzing anxiety that covers a brutal shame about her appearance and her obedience.

15 Indeed, to this very day whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their minds; 16 but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 18 And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.

The message of Transfiguration Sunday is that the Spirit reveals you as glorious, I tell her.

You.

Are.

Glorious.

Theology has conspired with family-of-origin issues in her life in a way that she’s convinced she’s despicable, that as her pastor says, “God cannot look upon you in your sin so God looks at Jesus.”

I wince.

“No, you are glorious.”

“But Lent tells me I’m dirt,” she says.

Hmmm.

I tell her about Lent. Lent (Lencthen) is a season of lengthening, of springtime hope, of new birth. The seed that falls to the ground bears fruit, I say. I ask her if she plans to go to Ash Wednesday services, and she says yes. I tell her that the imposition of ashes is a glorious thing – an invitation to return to the dust. No more anxious striving. No more cheap “enoughness” substitutes. It’s not about giving up chocolate, but giving up striving. Returning to the ground, the humus…a place of rest, humility, simply being.

“I’m so tired,” she says.

“I know.”

I share a quote from Rabbi Bunim: Keep two pieces of paper in your pocket at all times. One that says, “I am a speck of dust.” And another that says, “The world was made for me.”

“That’s beautiful,” she says. “I needed that.”

Dust and dignity.

Limitation and Love.

“Maybe I am gloriously ordinary and God loves me in that,” she says.

I call it “liturgical therapy,” I say.

Wiser people than me chose to place Transfiguration Sunday right before Ash Wednesday.

Moses ascended into the thin place where heaven meets earth, a place called Sinai. And he radiated the glory.

Jesus ascended the mount followed by his disciples. And he was transfigured before them.

But now you and I are the thin place, the place where heaven meets earth. The Spirit dwells in us, God’s temples.

And we are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.

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Chuck DeGroat

Chuck is Professor of Pastoral Care and Christian Spirituality at Western Theological Seminary MI, and Senior Fellow at Newbigin House of Studies. Click the pic to read more.